


parts of me remind me of you

by bookhousegirl



Category: Baseball RPF
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Boston Red Sox, Domestic Fluff, M/M, Slice of Life, Spring Training
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-26
Updated: 2016-04-26
Packaged: 2018-06-04 14:11:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6661699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookhousegirl/pseuds/bookhousegirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Every spring, Koji inhabits the strange landscape of south Florida. Some things bloom there, and his favorite of these is Taz.</p>
            </blockquote>





	parts of me remind me of you

**Author's Note:**

> For a slight change of pace, if not change of theme.
> 
> Thanks to Las for a few ideas here about Taz’s love for local food and Koji’s feelings about their imaginary house. Whether it’s Bruins or Sox, you’re the best. 
> 
> Title from Sad Dream by Sky Ferreira

Wilderness is not an accurate word for what this is. But it’s the only one he can think of when he looks out of the screened windows of the small back porch. There’s a murky looking creek, which he guesses is actually a river, but right now it seems depressing and small in the way southwest Florida can be to him. There are some palm trees, drooping in the early morning sun, and a few other houses that are still sleepy, not yet filled with any activity. Butterflies are attracted to the one drift of purple flowers that covers the dirt beds outlining the edge of the yard. It’s the one thing that looks actually thriving here.

 

Pulling out of the small circle of houses in this development, there is a paved road and then stretches of grass and sun beyond on either side. The signs of human activity, strip malls and golf courses and neighbors he never sees, dropped in the middle of marshes and strange trees and muggy heat make it seem like a wilderness that wasn’t ever meant for people to escape to. And so, a wilderness in Koji’s mind too.

 

This is the first year they’ve been in the house rather than one of the condo complexes closer to the facility, that the younger guys gather at. “Waterfront?” Taz had said excitedly when he showed Koji the specs that his realtor had found and asked for permission to have his agent rent it for them.

 

He felt unconvinced about the “waterfront” aspect of it, but liked the cheerful white kitchen that reminded him of Florida for some reason, and the porch where he imagined them eating meals at night if the humidity dropped enough to allow it. “Okay,” he agreed and smiled when Taz carefully stacked the papers and put them back into his folder. It was clearly provided by the realtor, but it made him feel excited for it too, with how seriously Taz had taken the whole thing.

 

Koji makes small circles, tests his right wrist that should be healed completely from the setbacks of last season. He flexes his hand, stretching out his fingers, and picks up his mug of coffee. It’s 6:30 and he should get a shower.

 

On the way to his bedroom, he practically runs into Taz who is heading slowly down the set of half stairs to the kitchen. “You were letting me sleep too long,” Taz complains.

 

“I wouldn’t.”

 

Taz laughs, rumbly and happy, even though Koji can see how tired he is. “You already did!”

 

“I’m sorry,” Koji tells him. “I made coffee for us. I’m just going to take a shower, okay?”

 

“Okay.” Taz carefully picks his way down the remainder of the stairs. “I’m glad we’re here together,” he says once he gets to the kitchen.

 

Koji is not sure why he is even standing there, still listening. But he feels happy, despite his worry about his wrist and the nerves that always accompany the start of the season. “I am too,” he says back softly, and he thinks about the wilderness of Fort Myers, the rising sun and the warmth of the south, and the promise of a new season, a new day.

 

Everything will wake up soon. Not just Taz.

 

***

 

It was Xander last year, or Christian, who showed Xander, who showed Taz this tiny Puerto Rican place in a strip mall near the airport that he’s now addicted to.

 

Taz does a decent job going through the menu, explaining what they want. It’s not the first time that Koji has wished they had taken Christian along to help, and he fights against the embarrassment of being two Japanese guys who barely speak English let alone Spanish in a place in south Florida.

 

“A coke, please,” he interjects at the last minute, pointing to the refrigerator full of glass bottles. He’s glad he said something because he’s not sure there is anything back at the house. After a day of meetings and now dinner, they haven’t had time to go shopping yet.

 

“Two cokes,” Taz adds fairly smoothly and pays with his bank card. Apparently the ordering was successful because at home Taz opens up a styrofoam container full of mofongo and plastic dishes stuffed with yellow rice and beans and he sighs delightedly. It’s one time of many, but Koji is still thankful for Taz taking the initiative with the food.

 

The carbonation from the coke makes a whoosh noise when Koji pops the tops and Taz clinks his bottle against Koji’s before he takes a long sip. The light is an unearthly orange as the sun begins to fall away and the patio is actually comfortable. “To the 2016 Red Sox,” Taz says. “And our first meal in our place.”

 

“Tomorrow we go to the store. This is a treat for the first night,” Koji reminds as they dig in, piling their plates full of chicken and delicious steaming rice and pork.

 

“Yes, yes, vegetables and fruit tomorrow. I’ll help pick stuff out.”

 

“And cook too?”

 

Taz smiles around a forkful of rice. “I will!”

 

After stashing the dishes in the dishwasher, making a mental note to buy sponges and dish soap, and facetiming with Kaz, he wanders into Taz’s bedroom where he is lying on his stomach on the unmade bed, watching a show on his ipad, in only his boxers.

 

“What is it?” he asks, settling in so he can try to watch too. The sheets feel weirdly warm, like everything here, although probably Taz was just taking up too much of the bed before Koji appeared.

 

“A show where this panel of singing experts tries to figure out if someone is a good singer from just watching them. They might be a good. Or they might be completely bad.” Taz shifts over to give Koji more space.

 

The show is in Korean and seems like a silly concept. The youtube videos are subtitled in English, which isn’t exactly more helpful. But Taz laughs a lot so Koji laughs too. “Don’t forget sunscreen,” he says absently, glancing down at Taz’s bare shoulder, and the inexplicable freckles that pop up on his pale skin there. He drops his head and kisses Taz’s shoulder for just a second.

 

“I won’t.” Taz’s eyes crinkle up at the corners. He’s watching a red-headed girl dressed in black leather attempt K-pop moves, but turns his head to the side, to view Koji over his shoulder. “Today was okay?”

 

“Okay. It’s just always how it is. The start of the season.” He pushes up against the too-soft mattress, which fights back. He wants to stay, to watch more videos with Taz’s body right beside him until he falls asleep right here. But he shouldn’t, and they have to be up early again.

 

Taz pauses the video and looks serious. “I don’t always need to get what I want. We don’t have to go to the place anymore, if you don’t like it. We can make food here, or go with Christian instead. You can say no to me and I won’t be upset.”

 

“No, I can’t, you know that.”

 

“I want you to like it here.” Taz frowns and stares.

 

“I do like it here. Especially the house with you.” Koji pauses at the door before saying goodnight, pleased that the light from the ipad or the warmth in his words make Taz’s cheeks pink. “Be up early tomorrow. We meet with Dana. Don’t watch too much reality show.”

 

The video times out of its pause and Taz wordlessly turns back to it. Koji retreats across the hall to his own room, the sounds of warbly singing and Taz’s soft laughter muffled through the walls.

 

***

 

The only places where he doesn’t stand out are at home, truly at home, which is Tokyo, and when it’s just Koji and Taz. Koji and Taz in the bullpen, Koji and Taz in Boston, Koji and Taz in their little house, Koji and Taz in their little world. Because then he’s never just one of one. He’s one of two and that instinctively feels so much better.

 

On the public beach at nearby Sanibel Island, they both stand out, especially next to Christian and ERod who come with them. Taz props himself up with his backpack and attempts to stretch out on the one beach towel they found at the house. It’s bright pink with lots of pineapples all over it. Koji is stuck with a regular bath towel, plain tan, almost the color of the sand here when it’s wet, until they go to one of those budget side of the road stores to buy more.

 

Koji puts on his sunglasses and watches their teammates bodyboard. It’s not crowded yet, even though it will be soon enough. There are pockets of people, families with children, who stretch out across the sand with umbrellas and beach chairs and tote bags. Next to him, an arm’s reach away, Taz has removed his shirt, and his body looks too blank and white, with not enough color yet.

 

This isn’t a wilderness. Most people would describe it as a paradise, he supposes. And it is pretty in a way that this place usually is not to him. There are flowering bushes in red and pink and white. It’s wild without being barren. He pulls out a book he’s been struggling to read this entire spring training and hasn’t gotten very far.

 

After an hour, seeing that Taz has rolled on his side to face him, he tosses the SPF 45 sunscreen onto the edge of Taz’s pineapple towel. “Don’t forget to reapply if you go in the water,” he warns.

 

“You should do it for me.”

 

Koji shakes his head. “No. Then my hands will get all greasy and sand will stick.”

 

Taz sighs dramatically. “Well, if you just went in the water with everyone else you could wash them off.”

 

“Someone has to stay with the stuff.”

 

“No one’s going to steal the stuff!” Taz laughs loudly, which makes Koji smile, even though it undermines the seriousness of his point. “At least tell me you’re having fun,” he pleads, taking Koji’s hand quickly in his and squeezing lightly.

 

Though he now has sand stuck to him because of the sunscreen, “I’m having fun,” is what he says in return, and he means it.

 

***

 

Not every closer is the same. The reputation is that closers must either be some sort of macho stud, or a technician with ice in his veins. Koji imagines Jonathan Papelbon has that kind of temerity, that he could be good at anything he wanted, like wrestling or skydiving or a triathlon, just by saying he could. And that Mariano Rivera has that kind of skill, like a surgeon with a scalpel, driving through space with his cut fastball.

 

For Koji, his skill is purely in the motion, in the movement of the ball to the plate. It means a lot that he could be the postseason hero for the team, when he admitted he wanted to throw up before going on to close out game six, when Taz had set him up perfectly by getting them out of a bases loaded jam.

 

Standing on an elevated mound of dirt, late in the game, when emotions are high and everyone is fatigued, when the spotlight is shining right on him and the game is on the line doesn’t necessarily come easy to him. Sometimes Koji would rather disappear, would rather fade away and let someone else shine and be there with words of encouragement that cross the language barrier and gestures that do too, like hugs and high-fives. As good as he is at pitching, he’s very good at those too.

 

This season should be different. The Red Sox acquired one the league’s best closers in Craig Kimbrel and they’ll look to Taz as a late reliever and Koji as the set up man who can hand it over. Neither of them will be tasked with shutting down the game now, and that should be good for his aging wrist and Taz’s fatigued arm and fatigued confidence too. For Koji it’s welcome. For Taz, he’s not sure. 

 

At JetBlue, after throwing with Blake for a while, he treks to the outfield grass where Taz is lying in the afternoon sun, hand shading his eyes.

 

“You forgot sunscreen,” he says automatically because he knows it’s true.

 

Koji sounds like a broken record. But Taz forgets every time and ends up pink and peeling like a paper rose, blushed and pretty but also full of complaints and annoyance until it evens out again. On Taz’s full, happy face his freckles pop even more then, like miniature punctuation marks and Koji secretly loves them all. _This one is a comma,_ he thinks, when he’s close enough to Taz’s cheek to view them, with his breath puffing lightly across Taz’s skin. _This one is a period because I like where it ends._ It’s so easy to disguise his reverence with worry. It suits him somehow.

 

He feels a tug on the leg of his team issued work out pants and sits down in the grass in between Taz and Robbie. Homer the dog has a go-pro strapped to his body and comes running by, sniffing Koji’s hand, wet and happy. Koji instantly looks around for Brock. He knows the dog doesn’t actually belong to Brock, but he feels like it should. He giggles a little when the dog’s tongue darts out to lick his palm. Maybe the go-pro is catching all of this. It would be fun to see later.

 

“Good boy, Homer,” Robbie says, reaching over to give the dog a hearty pet. “You’re such a good dog.”

 

“Good boy, Homer,” Koji repeats, smiling, and Robbie, who hardly ever talks to them, smiles back.

 

Walking to their car later, Taz elbows him. “New friend,” he notes and Koji looks quizzical.

 

“Homer?” he asks.

 

“No, Robbie!” Taz corrects and his grin is enormous. “We’ll invite him over!”

 

Koji feels light-heartedness bubbling over and he smiles with real joy then. “If you invite him, you cook,” he jokes and Taz hugs him, long and hard and tight.

 

***

 

Last year their days were filled with a constant thrum of teammates, especially when the full squad practices started, and the sensation of being on top of each other all the time in the tight confines of their condo. There were many trips to the Puerto Rican food place and catching rides with the other guys to Fenway South and boxes and boxes of baseballs that they signed every night, piled up in a corner near the one couch.

 

Wake up, meetings, work out, practice, dinner, work out, bed, forever in a cycle. It felt rare to get a breather, to sit squished together on the small loveseat watching netflix on Taz’s computer. It felt like a luxury to be alone, talking about their fears and expectations, Koji’s hand lightly massaging Taz’s throwing arm or shoulder, before someone knocked on the door and threatened to disturb their space.

 

When Taz unloads the groceries and puts the special yogurt that’s good for his digestion on the same refrigerator shelf as Koji’s, when he pulls the rice cooker from the spinning shelf of the lazy susan, in their little house now, Koji feels strangely satisfied. They live apart everywhere else in their everyday lives, Boston and Tokyo. But these few weeks in a place where they might never willingly choose to go are theirs.

 

It’s an off day, their first in three weeks, and their last before Opening Day. Which is why it’s a surprise that when Koji presses the small black button to start the coffee at seven and shuffles to the porch to take in the quiet of the barren landscape he sees Taz using the long garden hose to water the purple flowers. They’ve grown a little out of control in the past month, Koji’s noticed. But it’s an odd time to start trying to take care of something that will be on its own in a few weeks anyway. They’re set to vacate Florida soon.

 

“What are you doing?” he calls, opening the porch door just slightly.

 

Taz looks up and sprays the water in Koji’s direction, because of course he does. “I’m landscaping,” he says.

 

Koji picks his way across the grass and stands with Taz near the river bank, facing the house and the flowers. “We leave here in less than a week. What inspired you to take this task on now?”

 

“I’ve been watering them since we got here!” Taz protests. “You just didn’t see me.”

 

“You could barely keep a spider plant alive last year at the condo.”

 

Taz turns the spray onto Koji’s bare feet. The grass was already wet and sticking to his toes, but the misty light spray feels funny, like not enough pressure to clean them off properly. “This is our place, and I like doing things at our place.”

 

The tell-tale flutter in his chest arises then, like it does when Taz can somehow say what he often feels. “What do you want to do on our last off day then?” Koji asks, moving closer and draping an arm loosely around Taz’s shoulder. He’s wearing a worn Red Sox t shirt that looks like it’s from his first season and it’s soft and shimmery under Koji’s fingers.

 

“The Puerto Rican place?”

 

“Okay,” Koji laughs because Taz’s face looks so hopeful, as if he might be denied on their last night. “And what else?”

 

Taz is a few inches shorter, so his hair feels coarse and familiar against Koji’s neck when he rests his head on Koji’s shoulder. “Just spend the day with you? Watch a show on my ipad?”

 

“Okay. That sounds perfect,” says Koji, and the water is now pooling at his feet, forgotten from the hose, and creating mud and slosh in the grass, but this place doesn’t feel so much like a wilderness anymore.  

 

***

 

Kaz had sent him photos from Washington DC. In March the cherry blossoms were growing by the tidal pool and the the whole sky seemed to be filled with pink and white budding clouds. He makes it his phone lock screen. It looks like a fluffy blooming wonderland.

 

In Cleveland it rains so much they can’t even play. Taz snorts as the team bus which drives them to the hotel accidentally splashes a lone guy waiting on the curb. “Oops!” he chuckles and Koji shakes his head.

 

In Toronto they play against a really good team and Taz erases his demons.

 

In Boston they sit in the bullpen together on an endlessly beautiful afternoon when they’re down against the Rays but neither of them pitches. Koji gets called to warm up, but he doesn’t go in. Instead he relaxes next to Taz and feels happy that they’re protecting him a bit, trying to save the overused pen and build a little wall for his confidence.

 

“My realtor said the owners would be happy to rent to us again next season,” Taz says. “They said I did a great job with the landscaping.”

 

“I don’t believe you, but all right.” 

 

“I did water the purple ones every day! Sometimes when you weren’t up yet, or when you were on the phone with Kaz.” Taz looks out to the field and then back to Koji. “It just seemed important somehow.”

 

He’s not romantic enough or idealistic enough to believe that this is perfect, because they are losing right now. And when the light shifts behind the iconic green metal and smooth glass of Fenway Park it’s not home, not entirely, but any landscape that contains this, and Taz, is at least a place he wants to be.

 

***

**Author's Note:**

> The tv show is called I Can See Your Voice.
> 
> I have never been to Fort Myers, Florida, or JetBlue park, or a spring training game, and I feel that detracts from some of my usual authenticity here, but what can I do. Some day. I used google streetview and zillow and yelp for this, so you know it's super accurate. Apologies for any inaccuracies and for how potentially OOC this. RPF right? Shrug emoji.
> 
> Thanks so much for reading.


End file.
